If you are into making bags for everything from totes to backpacks to weekenders, then this book is for you. Written by Nicole Mallalieu, internationally recognized handbag designer and founder of the blog YOU SEW GIRL! The book includes 10 skill building projects, fully explained with detailed tutorials and illustrations. Learn professional techniques, shortcuts, and secrets for making couture bags. From Stash Books for C&T Publishing.

Follow the blog tour for this book where you could win a copy of the book at each stop.

The Material Girls in Dearborn, Michigan has nearly doubled in size from 1300 sq. ft. to 2500 sq. ft. increasing their display and classroom space. With a shop hop looming, Barb Fricano, owner of The Material Girls, had a door put in between two units, and a fresh coat of paint put on the walls of the adjoining unit in just two weeks.

“We were limited to a classroom of 4.” said Fricano. “Now we can seat 12 comfortably.”

The Material Girls new expansion increased classroom space!

Fricano started as an online shop in 2004 and opened her bricks and mortar shop in 2007. The Material Girls specializes in ethnic fabrics with Asian, Australian, African and batiks as her best sellers. Fricano ships fabric to Australia, Europe, Canada, Brazil, Norway, Sweden, Israel, and to the Czech Republic.

The Material Girls, Dearborn, MI. Before the expansion, fabric was stacked three high! The map shows all the countries that they ship to.

The Material Girls will celebrate their new expansion with a Grand Re-Opening April 22 – 26. Watch for a week’s worth of special deals!

The Texas Quilt Museum is celebrating the completion of Grandmother’s Flower Garden – a beautiful meditative space adjacent to the Museum, with their new exhibit “Butterflies and Their Beautiful Kin”, in Galleries I & III with a selection of 38 quilts. Butterflies symbolize rebirth and metamorphosis and the Texas Quilt Museum is transforming downtown LaGrange, Texas, into a favorite destination for quilt lovers from around the world.

Beautiful Morning by Melanie Marr on display at the Texas Quilt Museum April 3 thru June 29, 2014

“This exhibit shows how modern artists are reworking, quiltmaking, contributing new techniques, processes, and concepts to the historical continuum of quilts,” said Dr. Sandra Sider, Museum Curator. Selected quilts from the butterfly exhibits will be on display at the National Butterfly Center in the exhibit “Butterfly Whirl: Contemporary Quilt Art,” with possible stops in other venues around the country.

Roses bloom in Grandmother's Flower Garden, LaGrange, Texas

Antique Quilts from the Gundersheimer Collection is featured in Gallery II. This exhibit features 8 incredible antique quilts in a wide variety of styles and genres from the personal collection of Karen and Werner Gundersheimer. The pair had a deep love of folk art, embroidery and quilts, and you will see it in the selections like a vibrant Amish Shadow and Sunshine, a red and white alphabet quilt, a triple Irish Chain, and a 19th century Crazy quilt. Karen went on to write and/or illustrate more than 30 children’s books, and Werner became Director of the Folger Shakespeare Library. They collected quilts for decades, seeking them out at antique shops, shows, fairs, and flea markets.

Eighty quilters from 25 states took the challenge in April 2013 and created their vision of art quilts that would compete, to represent 100 years of Grand Central Terminal. Thirty of those quilts were picked to be on display in the New York Transit Museum Gallery Annex March 15 thru July 6.

Grand Central Terminal Rail Station, mid-Manhattan, New York

If you happen to be in New York, take a look. The quilt show is free. Top honors were awarded to Amy Krasnansky, a software engineer from Baltimore, MD who created “Time Flies, But We Take The Train”. Her quilt takes inspiration from 100 years of commuters, the famed Grand Central brass clock face, and the expansive ceiling in Grand Central with it’s aqua and gold colors.

"Time Flies, But We Take The Train" by Amy Krasnansky (photo compliments of Dale Riehl, City Quilter, NY

The contest was dreamed up by Dale Riehl, owner of City Quilter in Chelsea. Riehl noticed the 20th anniversery of American Patchwork & Quilting Magazine coincided with Grand Central’s centennial. The contest and quilt show was organized by The City Quilter and American Patchwork & Quilting Magazine in association with The New York Transit Museum and the Metropolitan Transportation Authority.

Riehl and his wife Cathy Izzo explored creating their own fabric lines and becoming licensees of the New York Transit Museum, which gave them exclusive rights to use subway maps and logos in their designs. The fabrics lines became: The Grand Central and the complementary GCT Constellations fabric lines; available in three colorways. Contest rules required each entry to use a minimum of 25% of this fabric in the design.

Celebrate the release of the Nobu Fujiyama Crane Dynasty Collection from Kona Bay by downloading and printing an “I Love Nobu” sign at Kona Bay Fabrics. Then snap a photo of yourself holding the sign inside your favorite one, two or several Quilt Shops. Email your photo to Kona Bay and be sure to include your name and the name of the Quilt Shop in the photo. All entries must be received by June 15, 2014. One lucky winner will win a Nobu Fujiyama Crane Dynasty Quilt Kit (86″ x 111″) valued at $250!

The Quilt Shop with the most entries wins a Crane Dynasty Quilt kit and a two-page feature in Asian Fabric Magazine!